Wednesday, August 25, 2010

Vegetable Chickpea Curry

Photo courtesy of Cooking Light

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a slow cooker is a working (wo)man’s best friend. However, many slow cooker recipes yield a boring chunk of meat that has been cooked in its own fat for several hours. Or maybe small chunks of cooked meat. In a sauce. There's nothing wrong with comfort food. Yet sometimes you want more than a hunk of meat for dinner, especially if you (like me) observe Meatless Monday or are attempting to lower your overall consumption of meat.

So off I went, scouring the Internet for a good meatless slow cooker recipe. Cooking Light came through for me once again, and I found this amazing recipe. The texture of the vegetables comes out perfectly done, not mushy at all, and the flavors are vibrant. Serve with brown basmati rice and a squeeze of lemon, and you’ve got yourself a tasty meatless dinner, packed with protein, fiber and of course, excellent flavor.
Vegetable Chickpea Curry

Yield: 6 servings (serving size: 1 1/3 cups vegetable mixture and 1 lemon wedge)

Ingredients

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 1/2 cups chopped onion

1 cup (1/4-inch-thick) slices carrot

1 tablespoon curry powder

1 teaspoon brown sugar

1 teaspoon grated peeled fresh ginger

2 garlic cloves, minced

1 serrano chile, seeded and minced

3 cups cooked chickpeas (garbanzo beans)

1 1/2 cups cubed peeled baking potato

1 cup diced green bell pepper

1 cup (1-inch) cut green beans

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon black pepper

1/8 teaspoon ground red pepper

1 (14.5-ounce) can diced tomatoes, undrained

1 (14-ounce) can vegetable broth

3 cups fresh baby spinach

1 cup light coconut milk

6 lemon wedges

Preparation

Heat oil in a large nonstick skillet over medium heat. Add onion and carrot; cover and cook 5 minutes or until tender. Add curry powder, sugar, ginger, garlic, and chile; cook 1 minute, stirring constantly.

Place onion mixture in a 5-quart electric slow cooker. Stir in chickpeas and next 8 ingredients (through broth). Cover and cook on HIGH 6 hours or until vegetables are tender. Add spinach and coconut milk; stir until spinach wilts. Serve with lemon wedges.

4 comments:

  1. This looks tasty, but I don't own a slow cooker. I could probably cook it stove top over low or maybe even on 200 in a casserole dish in the oven... Good find.

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  2. Sounds yummy and healthy too:) Out of curiosity, do you find meatless Mondays also save you money? i.e. do you think doing one day a week of no meat helps out the pocketbook? Might be a worthy post topic as well:)

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  3. Mark - Definitely! I will think about how to work that into a post in the future.

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  4. I've never had a slow cooker but understand this new generation of cookers is great. This sounds delicious, especially since I love chickpeas.

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Thanks for sharing your thoughts with me!